Operations, such as surveying, drilling, wireline testing, completions, production, planning and analysis can be performed to locate and gather valuable fluids (e.g., hydrocarbons) in underground geological structures (e.g., reservoirs). Acquisition methodologies can use information obtained from surveys to generate maps and other information of the underground geological structures. The maps and other information can be analyzed to determine whether the formations contain fluids and whether such fluids are reasonably recoverable.
In performing surveys, seismic sources and seismic receivers can be placed at various locations of a region on an earth surface (e.g., a land surface, sea surface, or a sea floor) with the seismic sources activated to generate seismic waves. Examples of seismic sources include explosives, air guns, vibrators, and the like that generate seismic waves. Some of the seismic waves generated by a seismic source travel into underground geological structures, with a portion of the seismic waves reflected back to the surface (e.g., land surface, sea surface or sea floor, or wellbore surface) for receipt by seismic receivers (e.g., geophones, hydrophones, etc.). These seismic receivers produce signals that represent detected seismic waves. Signals from the seismic receivers are processed to yield information about the content and features of the underground geological structures.